Balancing the development of autonomy with that of social
interdependence is a crucial aim of education in any society, but
nowhere has it been more hotly debated than in Japan, where
controversial education reforms over the past twenty years have
attempted to reconcile the two goals. In this book, Peter Cave explores
these reforms as they have played out at the junior high level, the most
intense pressure point in the Japanese system, a time when students
prepare for the high school entrance exams that will largely determine
their educational trajectories and future livelihoods.
Cave examines the implementation of "relaxed education" reforms that
attempted to promote individual autonomy and free thinking in Japanese
classrooms. As he shows, however, these policies were eventually
transformed by educators and school administrators into curricula and
approaches that actually promoted social integration over individuality,
an effect opposite to the reforms' intended purpose. With vivid detail,
he offers the voices of teachers, students, and parents to show what
happens when national education policies run up against long-held
beliefs and practices, and what their complex and conflicted
interactions say about the production of self and community in
education. The result is a fascinating analysis of a turbulent era in
Japanese education that offers lessons for educational practitioners in
any country.
